


This is Where the Party is.

by TattooedTA (Dreaming_Egypt)



Category: Urban Dead
Genre: Gen, Survival, Zombie Apocalypse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-03-19
Updated: 2014-03-19
Packaged: 2018-01-16 08:31:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,281
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1338844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dreaming_Egypt/pseuds/TattooedTA
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written on scraps of paper, some in pen, some in crayon, nearly all spattered with blood and gore, these are the recollections of Tatt, denizen of the quarantined city of Malton from 2006 to Present.</p>
            </blockquote>





	This is Where the Party is.

**Author's Note:**

> All characters and incidents are taken from actual in game moments from my time in Urban Dead. Clearly they've been built on but all creative license was taken to turn them into good fun. 
> 
> Tell me some of your stories in my comments if you want. We're all keeping the Dead back together. ;)

05-28-2006

  

I don't know how long I've been in this place.  There are signs that say Malton so I suppose that's what it's called.  I'm not even sure how I got here.  There was a party at a friend of a friend's house, there was alcohol, and then there was a long stretch of blurry images and have imagined thoughts until I found myself here.  Alone.  

Not that any of that matters now.  I never could find the house where the party was again and I did try.  I've made my way from one end of the city to the other looking for it and all I ever found were the walls.

Holy shit, the walls.  How did they get these friggin things built without anyone noticing?  You can't build ten stories of concrete and barbed wire around a city overnight but it looks like they managed it.  The armed guards at the top won't talk to you.  I tried to explain the mishap.  Tell them I had to get out.  I had a life out there, somewhere.  I couldn't remember what it was I did but I knew there had to be something.  I wasn't from Malton but didn't matter.  They aimed rifles.  The inference was clear. Get the fuck away from the walls.  So I did and I started walking.

I've been walking for days, maybe weeks, I'm not sure.  I've tried to be cordial.  I have skills.  I can help, but I've found little more than blank stares and suspicious glances.  I've gotten accustomed to having guns pointed at my head.  I don't stay long enough to discover if they've really got the balls to pull the trigger.  Shooting the dead is one thing, but when they're breathing and begging it's something else entirely. 

I get it, resources are scarce. You want to eat.  I do too but I'm not going to shoot you for a packet of ramen...yet.  Maybe I haven't been living this way long enough.  I hoped I didn't have to but it looked like most have settled in for the long haul.  Buildings were  boarded up but I could see dim lights, candles flickering, between cracks in the wood at night.  There were people living, well, surviving as best they could.  I think that's probably the only way to do it.  Maybe I just needed to find a place and start barricading, creating a home base for myself.  Then I could try to find more food.  Up until now, I'd been sleeping on fire escapes and when I was especially lucky, in trucks.  SUVs are the best.  The windows are usually tinted so nothing can see in and there's room to stretch out in the back.  I tried not to think about it when I found caches of snacks in the center console.  They were almost always baggies of stale Cheerios or candy.  Something a soccer mom had kept there to quiet fussy kids while they ran errands.

Thanks soccer mom, I hope your kids are okay but you've kept me going.  But for what?  I wasn't really sure.

It was a food run that changed everything.

Early one morning I'd exhausted the pack of Tic-Tacs from the glove box of my latest stop and the sun was boiling me through the windshield.  I was squinting and I was hungry.  There was no more reason to stay so I cracked the Corolla's door and listened. 

Looking doesn't always do much good.  The Dead like to hide down alleys and behind doors.  But you can hear them shuffling, groaning, bumping into things.  And don't get me started on the smell.

That day everything was silent.  No wind, no birds, just pavement, sun, sky, and hopefully something to eat somewhere.

I'd taken to raiding office buildings.  The grocery stores were the first stop but the shelves were always empty.  It seemed no one ever though of all those office workers squirreling away munchies in desks and there was always a little kitchen with a fridge full of complimentary bottled water or the secretary's diet cokes.  My backpack, also found beside a desk in a call center, was full with plastic bottles, single serve creamer cups, sugar packets and those lovely individually wrapped danishes.  It wasn't exactly a feast but at least it was food.

There was a building that said Sweetman above the door that had kept me fed for quite a while.  I'd made my way through the first couple of floors and hit pretty big in the stale doughnut lotto.  I was hoping there would be more higher up as I made my way down the middle of the street.  I'd learned it was much easier to skirt the cars left in the middle of the road than to go near doorways.  Things popped out of doorways and while I had an axe, the blade sometimes got wedged in skulls and that made it harder to get away.

I was climbing over the bed of a massive pick up truck when I heard something.  God, nothing is more confusing than sound after days of nothing, not even your own voice, so it took me a minute to figure out what I was hearing and process the white noise of a radio slightly off station.  I could barely breathe as I strained my ears.  Where was it coming from?  It sounded close.  Maybe there were people.

"Anybody..."  That was a voice.  There was a voice in the static.  My heart ratcheted up a notch as I hopped down and turned slowly, waiting to see if I'd made it up in my head.  "Hello?" More crackling.  "If there is anybody..."  I spun around and wrenched at the truck's door.  Of course it was locked.  "If anyone can hear..."  The signal wasn't great but as I peered in the window I could see a red light flickering on the dashboard beside an old fashioned hand-held CB radio.  I had to get in there.  

I didn't think, I just unslung my axe and brought the handle down on the window.  It bounced off.  Ugh.

"...safe place.  Anybody..."  Holy shit, I prayed they didn't stop talking and swung again.  It shattered.

"Wait wait wait!"  I was barely breathing the words as I reached past the broken glass and fumbled for the door lock.  "Keep talking..."

"Hello?  Anyone..."  Crackle crackle.  "...one out there?"  I was climbing inside, reaching for the mouthpiece.

"Hello?"  I hissed and had to swallow and try again.  "Are you still there?"  I waited, savoring the static, hoping I wasn't too late as I tried to hear over my pounding heart.

"Still here.  You have a name?"  I opened my mouth to tell him and realized I had no idea.  Shouldn't I know my own name? 

"I...uh..."  My hands were shaking.  "I don't know."  The long silence that followed terrified me.  I had no idea how exhausted I was until that moment.  People need people and I'd had terrible luck with them in Malton.  I could only pray this voice, the man on the other end would be different.

"That's okay.  You're not the only one."  He chuckled but not like anything was funny. 

"Okay."  I was nodding.  The voice had become my lifeline.  "Do you need people?"

"Are you alone?"

"Yeah. Have been for...fuck, I don't know.  Since I got here I think.  People are..."  Why was I telling this guy this stuff? 

"We're not like most of'em.  Where are you?"  All business, that voice.

"I think I'm in Dartside.  I saw a sign but I don't remember how long ago." 

"Long way to go."  He breathed and sounded tired himself.  "Head north.  Keep going north.  You'll find West Boundwood.  If you make good time it shouldn't take more than a couple of days."  I wished I had something to write this stuff down on.  "Head east until you find a place called Latcham Library.  I'll meet you there.  What do you look like so I know I have the right person?"

I glanced down at myself, my free hand going to my hair that hadn't been brushed or washed since I left the real world, jeans and shirt crusted with things I didn't even want to think about.  "Red hair, longish.  My eyes are green.  About five foot seven."  My mind raced as I came up with something distinctive enough to set me apart.  "Tattoos!  I have tattoos.  A lot of them.  There's a bat on my left arm.  I'll...I'll show it to you and you'll know it's me."  A cautious hope was growing under my ribs.  Surely I could survive if I had help.  This guy could be help.  No one could last in this place alone.

"Okay Tatt. I'll call you that until you remember your real name."  I could hear a hint of a smile through the static and I couldn't help but return it.  "I'm Ghost.  I"ll tell you that when I find you.  Don't ask me, I'll tell you.  That's how you'll know I'm really me."

"Got it.  Ghost."  I had a plan.  I had somewhere to be.  I couldn't remember when I'd felt that good.

"I'll be at the library in two days.  I'll wait there for two more.  I'll be watching."  I was nodding furiously as I wiped at tears I couldn't seem to stop from falling.

I had to clear my throat twice before answering him. "West Boundwood. Latham Library.  Ghost.  I guess I'll see you there."  I said and waited to see if there was anything more.  I was desperate for more.

"Yep.  Be safe."  And then the voice was gone.  Nothing but the haphazard pops and cracks of dead air.  It was time to go.

It took me two days to find West Boundwood and by the time I did, I wasn't sure I was doing the right thing.  The Dead were everywhere.  The farther north I went, the more I had to hide and climb to get away.  I didn't want to take the chance of fighting them off.  I had to get the the library so I just kept going.  I stopped only when I couldn't go any longer and slept only enough to get me moving again.  I ate my danishes on the go.  I was meeting someone and if I was late, I had no way to find him again.

The moon was up and full when I tried the door of the Latham Library.  Of course it was locked.  I was so tired.  My shoulders ached from the straps of my pack and the makeshift rig I used for my axe.  I just wanted to lay down and rest my burning eyes but I could hear the groaning not far away.  I had to find somewhere safe to wait for Ghost to find me.  He should've been there somewhere.

I stretched my neck and, as quiet as I could, made my way down the side of the big square of a building.  I wanted to get to the roof.  Up was the only really safe place since the Dead hadn't figured out ladders yet.  Also, a bird's eye view of the surrounding streets couldn't hurt so I worked my way around to the back.  The soles of my boots swished entirely too loudly in the long, wet grass.  I was sure they'd hear me and come.

"Sweet Jesus, thank you."  I whispered to myself as I spotted the dangling ladder of the fire escape and pulled myself up.  The groaning was getting closer.  I could hear the scuff of shoes dragging along the concrete now.  They had to have heard me, smelled me, something, to be moving so fast so I forced my aching muscles to pull me up and out of reach just before the ladder shook and the groaning turned into a wheezing wail as the dead hands missed my ankle and got the metal rung below it.  I ignored it and pulled myself higher.

As I boosted myself over the roof I shuffled around, peering down to stare at the herd forming below the ladder and breathed a sigh of relief.  I made it to the library alive, now I only had to wait.

"Show me your hands."  The voice behind me was accompanied by the sound of a revolver being cocked.

"Shit."  I muttered and did what I was told.  Of course.  They could have my danishes if they wanted but I was not about to take a bullet now that I was so near hope.  "There's some food in the backpack.  That's all."

"Tatt?"  Reality shrunk down to a pinpoint when I heard that name.  That was me.  The guy on the radio gave me that name. 

"Who's asking?"  I blurted still on my stomach at the edge of the roof.  The soft laugh above me calmed my racing heart a second before a hand, thick with calluses, appeared in my line of sight.  I took it and let him help me to my feet.

"I'm Ghost."  He said standing before me, his hand still on mine.  I nodded, smiling a half smile and shook his hand for lack of anything else to do.  "Good to finally meet you."

Still nodding I shuffled back and sat down on the air conditioning unit to rest my legs as I took him in. He was tall, his dark hair cut short as if he'd been in the military, the rest was covered by a leather trench coat.  I shouldn't have, but I trusted him. "You too." 

"Come on, only a little further.  You'll be safe with us."  Safe. What a strange thought.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


End file.
